LED Area Light

[Seanz0rz]

i demand parts list and a cost rundown!!!

[CJM]

yes parts list rundown and supplier list if possible.

Maybe how to wire them too, they are awesome!

[slosurfer]

We almost always have one of my wife's tripods with us, so it would be pretty easy to change that mount to work on a camera tripod (which would also work with my gorillapod which you mentioned) The gorilla pod is cool because it wraps around just about anything.

[4x4mike]

i demand parts list and a cost rundown!!!

The parts may be specific to your project but this is what I have going.

- 4, Q5 cree xre leds (ledsupply.com)
- Assorted optics spots, medium and tight ripple (ledsupply.com)
- Cree optics holders (ledsupply.com)
- 1, 1000ma Luxdrive driver (ledsupply.com)
- Aluminum for a heat sink (my garage)
- Assorted 18 gague wire (my garage)
- Little switch (Radioshack)
- 12V cord (from the orange whirly light)
- JB weld for gluing the stars onto the AL (Homie D)
- Maglight bezel (I had one from a long time ago. I hadn't planned on using it and in fact leaving the optics open was my original plan but I had the bezel and a glass lens so I used it.
- Assorted PVC drainage pieces (Homie D)


Thats all I used. If I were to make another one I'd maybe spend a little more time looking for a housing but I didn't want this project to take forever and I wanted it to stay cheap. I was going to use a metal housing which would have been great for heat management but it would have been larger than I wanted and taken too long to grind and cut.

My current one runs much cooler and is currently 13 minutes into a one hour test. I'm making sure it will run for at least an hour, not get hot and stay in one piece, so far so good. When I find my invoice I'll update with the prices.

As far as wiring look up the data sheets for the drivers. There are different ways of wiring depending on the number of leds, forward voltage, desired light output and type of led. I have 4 leds in series with one driver.

And as far as suppliers I went with ledsuppy because they had everything I needed. I've always gone with them for my drivers and they get to me real fast. The leds and optics can be had from anywhere. I spent a couple days looking at all of my options. Other suppliers that have a good selection are cutter and deal extreme. DX has many options but the shipping takes forever (Hong Kong) and the quality is lacking from what I've read. The have cheap leds but you don't really know the tint. Cutter and led supply let you pick your tint which is nice.

[slomatt]

Mike,

That's looking great! Did you buy the warm white leds, those look a lot less blue than the bright white ones.

- Matt

[4x4mike]

I did get the warm ones. Ken and I had been ordering a different tint from cutter and I like these more. Cutter has close to 10 tints and the ones we were getting seem to have a very very light green tint to them. Ledsupply has fewer options but these warm ones are great.

I used an old Niterider handlebar mount to add to the pvc pole and it stays put. It was a little windy today and the light swayed a bit so I'm thinking it will be temporary.

[paddlenbike]

You should have just stuck with the orange whirly light...that thing was sweet!

Seriously though, nice work, I need to get started on my gorilla pod one.

[4x4mike]

I might still go the Gorilla pod way. I welded a nut onto the u shaped bracket that I can get or make an adapter for. The light is quite bright and a spot for the most part which means that for the most use it needs to be mounted high or shining far. I'll have a week to play with it in Oregon and probably think up some more options. I made the u shaped bracket so I can mount anything onto it like the gorilla pod, a magnet or the niterider mount I have on it now.

[CJM]

No

You should have just stuck with the orange whirly light...that thing was sweet!

No, this is what he needs http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9cvX2N68qZ4
I got one on my work van and trust me its BLINDING! not mine but its close enough, 4 fast rotators, 4 mirrors, 2 flashing light front that are white, 2 red on back, side clear alley lights easily as bright a 55w hella 500.

[4x4mike]

Well I just got back from an 8 day trip to Oregon. Our friends have property up there and we went to visit. The baby did great considering we spent 8 nights in a tent and the temps were in the high 30's but mostly low 40's at night.

The property is quite plush with still being rugged. There is no electricity and the only running water is an artisan well that at the moment is not drinkable. There was a lot of propane flowing (lanterns and stoves) so it was nice but there are a lot of dark corners in 40 acres.

I was messing around with the camera settings so these are all a little different. For the most part the longest exposure seemed to be around 1.5 seconds in auto mode. The light did well and stayed cool the entire time. I changed up the mount to a magnet that I will rework this week. The pics are blurry so that's all you get.


Hatch light and rear cargo light
[img width=800 height=531]http://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e13/mezamichael82/leds/DSC_0220.jpg[/img]

Area light on
[img width=800 height=531]http://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e13/mezamichael82/leds/DSC_0243.jpg[/img]

Here you can see the different color in leds between my hatch light and area light. I like the area light color a lot better.
[img width=800 height=531]http://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e13/mezamichael82/leds/DSC_0244.jpg[/img]

Rocklights
[img width=800 height=531]http://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e13/mezamichael82/leds/DSC_0248.jpg[/img]

More
[img width=800 height=531]http://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e13/mezamichael82/leds/DSC_0250.jpg[/img]

[img width=800 height=531]http://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e13/mezamichael82/leds/DSC_0253.jpg[/img]